Now There Is One
by hanschens
Summary: Before Beth knew about Maggie Chen, or Paul, or Cosima, it was just her. Until someone left a note on her car door with a tip leading her to a woman named Alison Hendrix. Then there were two.
1. Chapter 1

Hello, clone club. This is my first OB fic so all comments and reviews are welcome. I stopped all my other projects to plan ahead with this one because I got excited, so please let me know what you think. A big thanks to my new beta Kathryn (bethschild on tumblr).

Beth opened her eyes. Bright light caused her to immediately close them again. The soft hum of the radio slowly crept back into her ears as her mind began to wake up. What time was it? Her eyes jolted open once more, unaware that then had closed again, to find the car radio: 5:40 PM. There were currently no active cases under her supervision and the last call she had heard on the police radio had been for a noise disturbance. It was a slow day, so she took the opportunity to stake out a personal case she was investigating. Beth wasn't sure when she had drifted asleep, but it was bound to happen at some point with the late hours she was working. The driveway across the street still remained empty. She had been awake during the time the husband had pulled up and parked in the one car garage at about 5:02 PM.

Another dispatch came through on the police radio and she turned it up to listen. It was a residential robbery about 30 minutes from where she was. Someone else would have to respond to it. Beth switched the radio off and began fidgeting with her shirt. There were a few spots of white fuzz on her black long sleeve shirt, probably left by the dryer. She swept her long hair aside to get the rest of the white particles dotting her arms and chest. The sound of a car caught her attention and she quickly shut off her own engine to avoid drawing suspicion. A red minivan driving a little over the speed limit headed in her direction. Beth took a deep breath. It was the car she had looked at on her computer screen for days. Hours of research went into learning everything she could about this woman without actually meeting her or tailing her. But this was it. She was the only one who lived close enough, ironically close.

Beth flattened her hair out as the van turned into the driveway across the street. She put on the black pair of sunglasses hanging from her visor. Hopefully, the glasses alone would conceal enough of her face. Fast fingers double checked that her gun was secure and her wallet was in her pocket. Beth watched as a woman got out of the driver's seat to open the side door of the van that had just pulled into the driveway moments ago. Two kids exited the van laughing and screaming. A small pain shot through Beth's chest: jealousy? If this was the woman she thought it was, then Beth knew it was jealousy. She remembered holding Paul's hand tight and listening to the doctor tell her she was unable to have children. Were these children Alison's by birth? They ran to the front of the house and Beth opened her car door and got out.

"Alison Hendrix?" Beth's voice was stern and steady as she crossed the street, despite the ball of nerves flying around her stomach. The woman turned and Beth felt her breath catch. It was like looking at a photograph of herself, but not like a mirror. She saw herself and did not see herself. It was her, but it was someone else entirely. Alison Hendrix: clone? Beth pulled out her wallet and opened it quickly, flashing her badge, careful not to show her ID photo, before shoving it back in her pocket. "Police. Do you have a minute, Mrs. Hendrix?"

"Mom, what's going on?" The boy was standing on the doorstep in front of his sister with the door half-open.

Alison turned quickly to them. "Go inside. Mom will be inside in a minute. Nothing to worry about." She smiled at them as they nodded and went inside, shutting the door behind them. Beth heard fast footsteps and caught movement from the blinds in the front window. "What is this about? Did you have to do that in front of my children?"

"Sorry, Mrs. Hendrix. Nothing is wrong. I just needed to know if you had a moment to talk, privately." Beth nudged her head towards the window and the woman turned to see two heads pop back inside. She turned back and motioned for Beth to follow. Alison quickly opened her car door and hit the button attached to her visor. The garage door rose with a groan and Alison hurried inside. Beth followed her in and watched as she locked the door into the house and hit the button inside for the garage door to close again. They were alone.

"Okay. What do you want?" Beth watched a different version of herself cross her arms and glare.

"I'm Detective Childs." She took a deep breath. The only thing to do was to get to the point. Beth had been waiting for this day. "I think you are a cloned experiment."

Beth watched her own face contort into a look of shock and surprise and then Alison laughed. "Excuse me, detective?"

She remembered when she would have reacted the same way a few weeks ago. That was until she had received an anonymous note with Alison's name on it and the words 'save yourselves, and find the rest' taped to her police car. It was written on a piece of stationary with a fish stamped at the bottom, but she had yet to identify the marking.

"Human cloning. I think you may have been a subject."

"This is absolutely ridiculous. Police or not I want you out of my house right now." The woman walked toward the button for the garage door.

"Wait." Beth grabbed Alison's arm and pulled her away from the button. She had hoped that the woman would be able to provide answer's willingly. "Look, I know you must know something. Someone tipped me off."

"I literally have no idea what you are talking about." She raised her free arm and brought it down against Beth's hand holding tight to her other arm. "Let. Go. Of. Me. I took a defense class. Stay away from me."

Beth withdrew quickly, shaking off the recent pain in her hand. She sighed deeply, wondering if this whole thing was a big mistake. Without another thought she reached up and pulled off her glasses. Alison's mouth dropped open and a small gasp slipped out.

"Mrs. Hendrix, I believe we are both subject's in a human cloning trial and I think something might be happening. I received a tip with your name which is how I discovered everything and I think we both may be in some type of danger." She waited for the momentary shock to pass over Alison's face and waited for a reply.

"Y-you look just like me."

There was a quick knocking on the garage door. "Honey? Are you in there? The kids said the police were here.

"Just a minute, Donnie!"

Beth quickly pushed her glasses back onto her face and rushed towards Alison, grabbing her hands. "Alison, I need to know if you know anything ." Alison shook her head, still staring at Beth in amazement. There was a slight click as the garage door was unlocked and Beth pushed herself around from Alison as a man walked into the room.

"What's going on here? Ali, are you all right?" He rushed over to her.

"Thank you, Mrs. Hendrix." Beth reached into her pocket and pulled out her wallet again. She addressed the man Alison had called Donnie. "I was just asking your wife if she knew anything about some robberies that have taken place in the neighborhood."

"I haven't heard anything about robberies. Why couldn't you just ask the both-"

"I got all the information I needed, thank you for cooperation." She opened her wallet and pulled out one of her business cards and shoved it back into her back pocket. Beth handed it to Alison, trying to keep most of her face hidden behind her hair from Donnie. "Please keep what we discussed to yourself and call me if you notice anything suspicious in the area. Mr. Hendrix, I'm sure your wife will fill you in on the robberies and just phone me if you have anymore information on the robberies than your wife did."

Beth leaned forward and hit the button on the wall to open the garage. Alison sat in stunned silence, with Beth's business card in her hand. "I am available 24/7 and I'm sorry for the intrusion. Have a nice night."

With that she turned and ducked under the rising garage door and headed back to her car without looking back. The door opened easily and she remembered that she had forgotten to lock it. The cop got in and shut the door. Her engine started quickly and she pulled off as fast as possible without bothering to buckle up. The car clock read 6:04 PM. Her life would never be the same.


	2. Chapter 2

Alison sat at the now empty table in her craft room with a glass of wine and Detective Child's business card lying on the table in front of her. All of the supplies for the gift baskets she was helping make for a neighborhood fundraiser now laid strung across all of room's counter tops. She brought the faint-red liquid to her lips and let the tangy taste fill her mouth before swallowing and flinching slightly at the bitter aftertaste. It had been months since she last had a glass of wine. She wasn't a drinker, but found it relieving when she was overly stressed out. Drinking had always been unenjoyable for her; she had no idea how alcoholics did it. After the Detective had left, Donnie had interrogated her for an hour about everything that went on in the garage. She had fed him the lie that Detective Child's gave her about the hush-hush robbery in the neighborhood. Ali had made up that the detective thought she might know something about the case because it was the Peterman's who'd been robbed and she was known to dislike them.

Donnie had seemed convinced and told her that he would take care of the kids for the rest of the night because he knew how these things affected her anxiety. Alison had then showered and dressed for bed, before heading off to the kitchen to pour herself a larger glass of wine than usual and clearing off her craft table.

"I'm a twin." The words escaped her mouth quietly. How long had she been sitting here staring at the phone numbers on the card? She picked up the business card and pulled out her phone. "I am a twin. I've been an only child all my life and now I'm a twin."

Ali typed in the phone number written on the card for Detective Child's cell and hit 'call'. She brought the phone up to her ear and listened to the first ring. "Oh God- I've got a sister." Alison quickly hit the 'end' button and threw the phone onto the table. A small sob pushed its way past her mouth and she felt tears flood her eyes. Her shaky hands made due even with the blurry vision and grabbed the wine glass off the table from where she had put it down to grab the phone. The detective had said human cloning, but that couldn't be it. They had to be twins. Did they even have the technology possible to clone humans? In between staggered breaths, she pressed the glass to her lips and drained it of its contents. Ali slammed the glass back onto the table and pulled the top of her pink and red plaid pajama shirt up to wipe her eyes. She wiped her mouth with her hands and rubbed them on her matching pants.

Now that she was able to see properly, she picked up the phone one more time and punched in the number. Alison hit the speaker button and slammed it back onto the table. A quiet ring filled the room and Ali glanced up to check that the door was locked. There was a small click after the forth ring and she felt her breath catch.

"Detective Childs."

Silence. Alison realized she still hadn't exhaled.

"Hello? Who is this?"

"A-Alison Hendrix," she said out of breath.

"Oh, Mrs. Hendrix." Now the silence came from the other line of the phone. "How can I help you?"

"Human cloning." Alison felt tears dotting her eyes again. "What makes you so sure? Maybe you were adopted and didn't know it. We could be sisters. I don't even look like my parents, and I've always wondered..."

"Mrs. Hendrix, there's more of us."

More? More of who? More Detective Childs, more Alisons? How could there be more people that looked just like her out there living lives completely different from hers? The effects of the wine had been making her feel a little dizzy, but Detective Child's last sentence made her feel as though she had suddenly sobered up. "What do you mean? I need to do explain everything right now. You said we might be in danger. I have a family!"

More silence, as though the woman on the other line was deciding whether to share what she knew or not. "You might need a drink for this, Alison. And make sure you're alone."

"Hold on." Alison pushed the chair back from the table and grabbed her wine glass as she stood up. The floor was cold against her bare feet and caused her to quicken her steps to the locked door. It unlocked with a loud click and she opened it slowly, trying not to let it creak. The house was silent and she assumed that Donnie and the kids were sleeping by now. The kitchen light was easy to flick on and the wine bottle was still on the counter where she'd left it, next to the fridge. Alison opened the bottle of piño noir and filled her glass to the top. She knew that this was going to be more than enough alcohol for her. It was much more than the last three times she had drank.

She closed the bottle and set it back on the counter. When she grabbed her wine glass, the liquid threatened to spill out with the slightest movement. Ali pressed her lips to the edge of the glass and unattractively sipped everything up that might have spilled out. The brunette wiped her mouth with her sleeve, no longer caring about manners. Perhaps it was the wine she had already drank that made her so unorthodox. The light in the kitchen turned off easily and she tiptoed back into the craft room, shutting the door behind her. She took one huge swig of wine before sitting back down and announcing to the woman on the other line that she was back and alone.

"Okay." There were sounds in the background that sounded like the clicking of a computer mouse. "A few weeks ago I found a note on my car that had your name on it. It said, 'save yourselves, and find the others'. I didn't know what it meant until I ended looking you up and looking at photographs of myself that I didn't remember having taken. I spent days doing backgrounds checks on you which, by the way, you might want to pay off your parking tickets."

Alison grunted in response. She didn't like the idea that this cop had spent so much time researching her. "I'll get to it. That's not important." She took another drink.

"Well, it wasn't until around that time that I actually started concentrating on the other part of the message: 'save yourselves, and find the others'. I spent awhile trying to find ways to track down what that could have meant. Of course, I thought it was possible that we were twins or something until I got the idea to run my face through facial recognition software in the North America. As you can imagine, it came up with some errors and it gave me a new name. Cosima. There's someone else who looks like us, Alison. We aren't related. We're cloned. She lives in California but I haven't contacted her yet because you were so much closer."

"There's someone else who looks just like me?"

"Yes."

Alison took another heavy swig from her glass, unhappily finding that it was almost empty. "Um, Detective Childs-"

"Beth."

"I'm sorry?" She was confused.

"Call me Beth, Alison."

"Okay... Beth." Saying the cop's name made the situation feel real. Alison realized that she had been skeptical during the entire conversation, but now, saying the woman's name, it was real. "What did you find out about the part about saving us?"

"I haven't." There was a deep breath. "I haven't figured out anything, which is why I wanted to warn you."

"Well, that doesn't do me any good. What am I supposed to protect myself from or how?"

"My best guess is that obviously human cloning is not legal. And I'm assuming that if us, the experiments, get found out, it is the government's job to exterminate illegal material."

"So... you're saying the government would eliminate us!? There's not even any proof about all this cloning nonsense that you are talking about. Why would anyone come after me? I'm very involved in the community and I do charity work."

There was a pause before Beth replied. "Clones or not, I received a warning. I'm not saying anything, Alison. Only that we should both be careful."

Ali raised her glass once more and drained the liquid into her mouth. She blinked her eyes in an attempt to push aside the fuzzy feeling she could feel creeping into her body from the alcohol in her system. "If something happens, I have no way to protect myself. Or my family."

"I'll get you a gun and teach you how to shoot. It's the least I can do. Get some sleep, Alison. You've had a very complicated night."

The boozy brunette grabbed the phone and took it off speaker as she pushed herself away from the table once again. She was a little off balance but her fingers grasped the wine glass and she headed to the kitchen once more. "That's the understatement of the year."

"I will text you tomorrow with a date, time, and place where we can meet again. And I'll teach you more than you learned in that defense class you said you took. Goodnight, Mrs. Henedrix."

Alison hit the 'end' button and shoved the phone into the chest pocket on her shirt. She placed the wine glass in the sink and then grabbed the bottle from off the counter. She popped it open took three large gulps. Her vision was blurring more so than it had been when she was in the craft room, but it partly might have been because the alcohol finally hit her once she stood up. The bottle hit the counter with a small clink and she turned to walk upstairs, leaving the bottle open. The stairs creaked every time her foot landed on one and she was reminded of all the times Donnie vowed to fix them. Stupid Donnie. She was never going to tell him what really happened because she didn't trust him the way she trusted herself to take care the family. Instead she would put her trust in a cop that looked alarmingly like her and could teach her how to use a gun. Alison pushed open the door to her bedroom and stumbled over to her side of the bed. Donnie's snores seemed to echo off the walls, but as she lay down they turned into a lullaby of sorts. Maybe it was the alcohol, maybe it was the shock and exhaustion. Alison fell asleep.


End file.
